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Author
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Topic: Auro 11.1 - Its Rollout & Marketing
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Lyle Romer
Phenomenal Film Handler
Posts: 1400
From: Davie, FL, USA
Registered: May 2002
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posted 07-27-2014 11:58 AM
quote: Bobby Henderson
However, theater operators are not required to separately amplify each surround speaker. They can install Atmos in anything from a basic 9.1 setup where all the objects are folded down into the beds layer to a maximum setup where every surround speaker is individually programmable. And it can go anywhere in between.
I know that they can do this but why would an exhibitor spend let's even say $20,000 on a CP-850 (assuming a big discount from list) and then skimp to save $5,000 or whatever on not doing individual amps for the surrounds?
It's kind of like back when digital sound first took off. The theaters that installed Dolby Digital with the DA-10 (and $20k price tag) tended to do the required upgrades. The theaters that wanted to do digital on the cheap would install DTS and leave everything else.
The equivalent now would be just doing 7.1 if you want to do something on the cheap, or even Auro if you want to throw speakers on the ceiling for people to see.
If they wanted to skimp, why bother installing Atmos at all? It's not like back when digital sound first came out and there was a huge advantage to just have "Digital" on the marquee. Other than the trailers, most of the exhibitors that actually have it installed are making very little effort to market the fact that they have it.
In Florida, there are 2 Atmos auditoriums within reasonable driving distance of my house. One is an AMC ETX and one is a Frank "FDX" auditorium. If I didn't know they had Atmos, I'd never know by looking at show times. They do market the fact that it is playing in the acronym auditorium but not the Atmos installation.
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Lyle Romer
Phenomenal Film Handler
Posts: 1400
From: Davie, FL, USA
Registered: May 2002
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posted 08-07-2014 09:26 AM
I finally decided to read Barco's whitepaper on Auro so I could decipher the channel layout once and for all. The more I read about it, the dumber it seems.
The overhead channel that I assumed was at least left and right is just a mono overhead channel.
The layout is just 5.1 with a height channel on top of each of the normal 5 channels and then the mono overhead channel added.
Who came up with this layout as "3D sound" is questionable. The whitepaper talks about having a regular and height channel at the 4 corners of a cube. The only thing is that the normal surround channel is relatively high off the floor to start with. Then, with stadium seating, some of the speakers are only a couple of feet lower than the new height channel.
If you isolated one speaker from the normal and one from the height channel that are on top of each other in the rear third of a stadium auditorium and alternated a sound from one to the other I doubt that anybody could tell which speaker was playing.
One funny thing in their whitepaper comparing Auro to object based systems is the apparent justification for eliminating rear surrounds. They say that because of human "Tiger Gene" instinct to be sensitive to sounds from the rear, it is too distracting for rear channels to be used very much.
I still say that a 9.1 (7.1 plus stereo ceiling) or 11.1 (my 9.1 plus Lc and Rc) mix down of an Atmos mix would be far superior to Auro 3D and not require any expensive processor, just channel assignments).
Hell, make it 15.1 (utilizing all DCI audio channels) by splitting the side and ceiling surrounds into front and back. That would be even more superior to Auro.
In reality, all Auro seems to be is a way to play processing tricks on the existing channels. They add the mono "Voice of God" channel from the enhanced Surround EX (whatever Dolby called using the 4th matrix decoded channel for ceiling).
Only they removed the biggest enhancement to 5.1 in the last 20 years which was the addition of the rear (mono or split) surround to allow for better flyover effects.
I would like somebody in the industry to set up an auditorium that can play back Atmos and Auro using the same speaker and amplifier models. Then put an audience in there and run A/B clips from movies with both mixes and let people choose which sounds better. After Atmos wins, run the same test between Auro and 7.1.
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Connor Wilson
Expert Film Handler
Posts: 190
From: Sterling, VA, USA
Registered: Jan 2011
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posted 08-07-2014 11:02 AM
I'm curious as to if anyone actually saw a movie in Auro 11.1. This thread is filled with skeptism, not that I oppose it but I rarely hear anyone talk about how a film sounded in 11.1. You might say your 96kHz/24bit FLAC of a classic album sounds better than my original vinyl pressing from the original analog masters, but you haven't listened to it. While your case may be true, if the FLAC is direct from the studio masters and does not include any peak limiting, compressing BS that is on lots of CDs today. But perhaps my vinyl was cut during a time when the masters were new and hardly had been degraded, making your FLAC sound grainier than my campfire-sounding LP. The truth is, it's all a matter of subjection.
I saw "Lucy", a movie mixed in both Atmos and Auro, on the XD screen at Cinemark Towson 15. The day before I spoke with the manager if the screen was Auro-capable, and he said it was ready but yet to be configured. I sworn I could've heard height effects when I watched the movie, perhaps very obviously during the song 'God's Whisper' at the end credits, in which the height left and height right surrounds ping-ponged each other. There was no 7.1 available in the DCP, and the 5.1 has Auro metadata. There was a gaping hole behind me in the sound field, but at least I felt sounds above me. Overall, it's a more subtle, more dense format over 5.1.
So did I really hear Auro, or was my mind playing tricks?
Oh, and the "voice of god" is mono because the creator of Auro said anywhere in the room should give you the same feeling of hearing from above, rather than split the two. I guess he wants to prevent in a split overhead setup one guy sitting on the left not hearing the overhead right as clear as the overhead left to him, vice versa for a guy on the right.
In the end, if I were to make a line of succession from least favorite to most favorite sound set up, it would be like:
1.0, 2.0, 4.0 (Dolby), 4.2 (Baby boom), 5.1, 11.1 (Auro), 7.1, Atmos
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Terry Lynn-Stevens
Phenomenal Film Handler
Posts: 1081
From: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Registered: Dec 2012
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posted 08-07-2014 03:12 PM
quote: Lyle Romer
I finally decided to read Barco's whitepaper on Auro so I could decipher the channel layout once and for all. The more I read about it, the dumber it seems.
The overhead channel that I assumed was at least left and right is just a mono overhead channel.
The layout is just 5.1 with a height channel on top of each of the normal 5 channels and then the mono overhead channel added.
Who came up with this layout as "3D sound" is questionable. The whitepaper talks about having a regular and height channel at the 4 corners of a cube. The only thing is that the normal surround channel is relatively high off the floor to start with. Then, with stadium seating, some of the speakers are only a couple of feet lower than the new height channel.
If you isolated one speaker from the normal and one from the height channel that are on top of each other in the rear third of a stadium auditorium and alternated a sound from one to the other I doubt that anybody could tell which speaker was playing.
One funny thing in their whitepaper comparing Auro to object based systems is the apparent justification for eliminating rear surrounds. They say that because of human "Tiger Gene" instinct to be sensitive to sounds from the rear, it is too distracting for rear channels to be used very much.
I still say that a 9.1 (7.1 plus stereo ceiling) or 11.1 (my 9.1 plus Lc and Rc) mix down of an Atmos mix would be far superior to Auro 3D and not require any expensive processor, just channel assignments).
Hell, make it 15.1 (utilizing all DCI audio channels) by splitting the side and ceiling surrounds into front and back. That would be even more superior to Auro.
In reality, all Auro seems to be is a way to play processing tricks on the existing channels. They add the mono "Voice of God" channel from the enhanced Surround EX (whatever Dolby called using the 4th matrix decoded channel for ceiling).
Only they removed the biggest enhancement to 5.1 in the last 20 years which was the addition of the rear (mono or split) surround to allow for better flyover effects.
I would like somebody in the industry to set up an auditorium that can play back Atmos and Auro using the same speaker and amplifier models. Then put an audience in there and run A/B clips from movies with both mixes and let people choose which sounds better. After Atmos wins, run the same test between Auro and 7.1.
I think you take things way too seriously.
If you don't like Auro, then do seek it out. Keep watching your movies in Atmos. I am amazed that you would drive out of your way to watch a movie in Atmos, but to each his own.
I am always amazed at people who keep bitching about sound formats, people like what they like, so what is wrong with that? It is like cars, people buy cars that make no sense sometimes, but whatever, they bought it because they liked it.
I for one prefer classic purpose built IMAX auditoriums where the speakers are placed way up high and these speakers are custom built for that particular theater, to me it gives a better localized source and it works for me, I also like the classic purpose built locations as they add a form excitement when going to see a DMR movie as the auditorium is unique, I think theater architecture is interesting. I could care less about Atmos and my experience with it (Man of Steel) was downright dreadful, I will never seek it out again. I have seen a number of Atmos movies (just happened to be Atmos) but I don't remember all that much about the sound as I was more focused on watching the movie. I will say this though, every time I have been in an Atmos location, the previews always sound like the preset hall, game modes on a home theater pro logic system, I wonder if the Atmos processor is playing some sort preset on the trailers. The Dolby Atmos unfold trailer is one of the best sound trailers I have heard, I gotta say that.
I do not care too much for IMAX digital retrofit surround speakers (the non-purpose built locations, the ones you find in a AMC stadium seating theater) as the way they are designed, you have to really sit in the second third of the theater to hear the sound. The front speakers drown out the rears in the front half of the theater.
Before stadium seating, THX theaters were pretty good but stadium seating THX locations were still better than non THX theaters.
For me, I think sound mixing, theater design, theater speakers and EQ play a much more important role in the enjoyment of the movie than whether the movie is 5.1, Auro or Atmos.
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